Forever
by Tiffsababe
Summary: A collection of my small short stories I'm using to get back into the swing of things. Not always BABEs but never CUPCAKEs.
1. Forever

**Forever**

 **A/N: So my friends on FB told me, in order for me to collect my thoughts and get back into the rhythm of writing again, I should do a quick short story. To get the juices flowing, or so they say. So no flames, please! This is just a quick little scene to get my brain back in working order. Thanks, Tiffany**

Isolated deep in the forest of towering redwood trees, he quickly led her through the silent giants, wary of what may be following them. All appeared calm and serene to the untrained eye, but he knew better.

Hate filled eyes watched the man lead the injured woman over, under and around the obstacles in their path to freedom. Little did they know that the freedom they so desperately wanted was no longer an option. It was never an option, from the moment they stepped onto his land. They would always be, HIS.

Ranger tried to negotiate the overgrown path as best he could with a severely injured Stephanie, but it was slowgoing at its best. He had debated carrying her, making their escape all that much quicker, but it was obvious that she wanted no part in that.

"Babe. I can carry you, you know."

"Ranger. You don't have the strength. Besides, I can't go much further." She stopped dead in her tracks, bending in half as coughs wracked her tiny frame. "I... I think I'm done." She dropped to her knees and used the back of her hand to wipe away the spittle from her chin, never noticing that it wasn't spittle but dark blood.

Ranger's eyes widened in near panic. Blood? She must be hurt far more worse than she let on. He took a quick moment to collect himself before, he began to assess her current condition. As he began to press on her abdomen, he knew. It was hard as a rock. Internal bleeding. If he didn't get her out soon, she would die.

"Babe. I can hear the ocean. My SAT phone will work as soon as we get out of the trees. I have to get you to safety. You need to make it for me, Babe. Please?" He was not above begging, if it meant she would live.

"Can't you run ahead and call, then come back for me?" She whispered, as her eyes began to droop. "I think... I think I'll just sit here and wait for you to come back." Stephanie slumped over as the last words fell from her lips.

Ranger hoisted her into his arms into a bridal carry and made a mad dash towards the sound of the ocean. Ten minutes later, he laid her down on the soft salt grass and searched his cargos for his phone. As he pulled it from his pants, a soft gurgling sound came from Stephanie's mouth as a bloody foam escaped her lips. In a panic he rolled her onto her side to allow the blood to escape as he dialed his contact.

"12 clicks from target area, along the beach. I've got a 33 year old female with internal bleeding. Chest rattles and bloody foam from the mouth. Faint pulse and unconscious. What's you ETA?"

"Copy that. ETA in 2. We've got a PJ with the helo crew. ETA in 2."

"Copy that." He flipped the phone off and dropped it onto the salt grass next to Stephanie. "Babe." A lone tear streaked down his face at the sight of the love of his life slowly losing hers. "Don't leave me. Fight, Stephanie. FIGHT!"

"Rang... Ranger?" She whimpered, blindly grasping for his hand. Grabbing ahold, he knelt down to hear her better. "I love you." She smiled weakly, "I have always loved you."

"Babe. I love you. No conditions. No qualifiers. I love you." His lips brushed against hers, ignoring the blood that still seeped out.

"And the baby... " She coughed again, covering him in a fine red mist. "... the baby loves you too." A shiver ran down his spine. A baby? Dear God! She's pregnant?!

"Babe?! We're pregnant?" He asked, a tearful smile upon his face. "Babe? Steph?!" She was now unresponsive and her palor began to grow grey. "Babe don't you leave me! I love you!" He grasped her body in his warm embrace, "Don't leave me." He whispered as the sound of the helicopter began to grow in the background.

The moment the helo skids hit the ground, Stephanie released her last breath. Ranger was beside himself. No. NO! She can't leave me. NO! He motioned the PJ over to assess his Babe, only to get a grim look in return and a small shake of his head.

How could she die? Better yet, how could he live without her? The moment the rescue crew realised that things were headed south, it was already too late. Ranger had already pulled his sidearm, pointed it at his head and pulled the trigger. His body fell alongside the Babe he so dearly loved. Together in life and now together in death.

Forever his Babe.

The lone figure stood watching from the edge of the woods, a small smile upon his face. He was right. He was always right. They were never destined to leave this place. They were always his. With a swish of his hand, he disappeared, leaving nothing but a small spot burned into the ground where he once stood.

 **A/N: I know it was a dark fic, but I had to start somewhere, right? So what did you think? I'd love to know. R &R please! **

**Tiff**


	2. Bikini Wax

**Bikini Wax**

The guys all huddled under the small makeshift shelter they had been able to throw together with what little they had available. It wasn't much, but with the back of the shelter being a reminant of an old bear cave, they at least, had a little room to spread. The lone tarp did little to stop the wind from whipping through the area, but managed to keep most of the rain out. Cal and Hal struggled to start a small fire, just large enough to boil water for them to drink and stay warm.

"Fuck man. You got any embers yet?" Bones whined, as he furiously rubbed his hands together to stay warm.

"We're trying." Cal growled, giving Bones a hard look. "You want a crack at it, genius?" A shake of his head was Cal's only response.

With a small grunt, Hal was releaved to finally have a tiny flame licking at the diminuitive pile of dry twigs the guys had managed to gather. As it grew, it was apparent that they were going to have to suck it up and hand over their cornchips as fuel for their tiny fire. "Alright. Someone fork over their chips."

"What the fuck man?! They're all we got." Les whined, trying not to get any more of his leg wet from the rain.

"I don't care. Cornchips are cooked in oil. Oil will fuel the fire. Hand 'em over." Hal held out his hand and waited patiently for them. After a loud sigh and a lot of loud crinkling, every man handed over four chips, including Hal, who fed them into the fire allowing the flames to grow. After the large logs caught, he sighed a breath of relief and sat back, allowing the fire to begin to warm his tired and achy body.

"It's gonna be a long night Gentlemen. Seeing as we're in what looks to be the Appalachin Mountains, it'll be a little while before we can find a town and make our way home. We will be dealing with a seriously pissed off Ranger, once we get back." Lester announced, giving the group a pissed off look. "And the next time someone mentions about Beautiful walking funny, I'm gonna rip your head off."

Hal nodded and then glared at Bones, "And the next time someone asks if it's from a good shagging, I'm gonna make you wish Santos was the one metting out the punishment."

Bones sighed as he rubbed the top of his head with one of his hands. "How the fuck was I supposed to know it was from getting a bikini wax?"

 **A/N: I'm still working on getting the creative juices flowing still. What do you all think? R &R please!**


	3. Sweets

She couldn't help it, she shot off of the comfy leather couch and booked it over to the bathroom. Sliding to a stop on her knees in front of the toilet, she painfully emptied her stomach. A cool hand gently pulled her hair back and out of the way, allowing her unimpeded access to the bowl. After dry heaving a few times, Steph finally rocked back onto her heels and groaned. She wiped the vomitous remains from her chin and closed her eyes, hoping against all hope that it wasn't who she thought it was holding her hair.

"Sweets, you okay?" She cringed internally. Yeah, it was EXACTLY who she feared it was.

"Yeah." She slowly made it to her feet, flushed the toilet and shuffled over to the sink to clean up. She managed to wash her hands, rinse out her mouth and gratefully accepted the breathmint passed into her hand without further incident. "Thanks."

"Yep." Steph could hear him settle himself against the wall. Arms and ankles crossed, no doubt. As she chanced a peek, she had been right in his assumption. There he was, arms and ankles crossed. Dressed to kill in his usual uniform of black boots, black cargos and a black Rangeman t-shirt pulled over his massive pectorals and biceps. Damn it, she needed to stop before she began to drool. His steely grey eyes cut right though her as she tried to look away. "So," he began, not a hint of emotion on his face, "wanna tell me what is going on?" His whole demeanor meant business.

"Umm... nope." She fiddled with her hands, trying not to give in. But she knew better. He would wait her out. No matter how long it took. He knew it, too. His eyes remained on her face, searching for the answer. After a good minute and a half, Stephaine caved. "UHG! Fine!" His small nod to the living room, indicated he wanted to speak with her out in the open. "Unh-un! Nope. Not out there. Everyone will hear us."

"Sweets, they already heard your hurl-fest." He stated, trying to lead her out of the bathroom.

"No." She changed direction and headed for his bedrom. "In here." She closed the door behind them, with a small click. He then assumed the parade rest position in front of the bed, eyes warily watching her every move.

Steph started to mumble to herself as she began to pace back and forth in front of him until he couldn't take it any more. "What is it?" He growled, upset something was wrong with her. "Are you sick? Is it cancer?" Her shocked look made him reel. It was! It was cancer, he knew it! Then hismind was off in it's own little world trying to figure out how they were going to face it and beat it.

It wasn't until she began to laugh that he pulled himself out of his little mental tyrade. "It's not cancer, you idiot." She shook her head, wiping away tears of laughter from her eyes.

"Then what is it?" He was baffled. She had lost a ton of weight, she had been ill many times over the course of the last month and a half, she was eating like a bird and she was lethargic. That spelled out cancer to him.

It's not cancer. I'm..." She glanced at the door, trying to decide if anyone was listening just outside. Still suspicious of the house guests, she leaned over and whispered into my ear, "You're going to be a Daddy." The smile I had nearly cleaved my face in two. I snatched her up into my arms and spun her around.

"Are you serious?" She nodded before a smile lit up her entire face.

"Bobby confirmed it this morning. We're pregnant." Not caring of what had just happened in the last ten minutes, I smashed out lips together in a brutal kiss. God, I loved this woman. This woman who was now going to birth my child. This woman who I loved more than life itself. She was the mother of MY baby.

Too happy to hold it in, I dragged a still laughing Steph out into the backyard, surrounding ourselves with our co-workers and friends. "Steph just told me... WE'RE PREGNANT!" The guys surrounded us, congratulating us with hugs for Steph and handshakes & fistbumps for me.

After a few minutes, Tank pulled me aside. "Zip, man. Congrats." We did our little "man-shake" as Sweets calls it. "You do know that Ranger's gonna kill you if you hurt her, right?"

"I wouldn't expect anything less, man. He okay?" I looked across the yard watching Santos kneeling with his face in Steph's belly, talking some type of gibberish.

"He should be home in about a year or so. I'll let him know." With a nod from me, Tank walked away chuckling at Santos' antics.


	4. Rabbit

I was desperately trying not to compromise my current position. My breathing was the most difficult to control, but control it, I did. Although my body was demanding huge quantities of oxygen to fill starving lungs, I carefully overrode my it's response to my desperate situation. My slow, controlled breaths came and went as silent as possible. The loud thumping of my heart reverberated in my ears, making it sound thunderous in the small hiding space I had managed to find myself in. But nothing, and I mean nothing, would make me reveal myself before I was sure I was completely out of danger.

The ever so slight sound of fabric rustling brought me out of my meditation to control my breathing. I strained my ears to catch another sound, only to hear nothing. A minute goes by. Nothing. Wait! Another sound of fabric but much farther to my left. Is it the same person, or another? They are a team? With these thoughts swirling in my brain, I could hear the slightly nasaly sound of one of the assailants coming closer.

From across the room, I could hear Assailant #1. "She's gotta be around here somewhere. She couldn't have just disappeared." Clearly, this guys was annoyed that finding me was more difficult than he had anticipated. Good.

"She's closer than you think, man. She might be hiding upstairs." Assailant #2, whispered from a location much closer than I felt was comfortable. "You stay on this floor, I'm heading up to the other levels." They both left my immediate locale and I made a run for it. If I could make it down another couple of floors, I had another hiding place that I could hole up in for the rest of the search and they'd never find me. I snuck a glance at the camera doing a sweep down the hallway I was in before I sprinted for the janitor's closet a couple of doors down.

With a quiet 'snick' the door shut behind me, giving me the privacy I needed to escape. I carefully pried the door off of the air vent and slid in, firmly pulling it into place behind me. I slid along the aluminum vents, making me way to the ladder that would allow me to decend the couple of floors to my hiding spot. A few minutes later I found myself in front of the final air vent, a small smile on my face. Mission nearly complete. All I had to do was get into the room and slip into the small cubby space that I had found behind the rear bookcase. Like I said,they'd never find me.

I could hear voices in the vent, but far off in the distance. "She's gotta be in the vents. I found drywall dust on the floor in front of the one in the janitor's closet on level 3."

"Well. Climb your fat ass into the vents and get her!" Assailant #2 was pissed for sure. "She's going to get away!"

Without a second thought, I pried the covor off the vent and passed through, replacing it as soon as I was able. I was sure to blow away any drywall dust. Not this time, guys. I grinned and crossed the room to slide into my hiding space. With enough food and water to last me a week down there, I could hide long enough for them to finally give up.

I stayed in my little cubby for almost three days, only venturing out to sneak into the closest bathroom to relieve myself. No one expected me to make it this long. Only a text from a certain Cuban Sex God made me finally give in.

 **Ranger:** **Babe. I'll have Hal waiting with a Pino's meatball sub afterwards, if you come out.**

 **Steph:** **Make it a sub and no running for a month, I'll come out.**

 **Ranger:** **Done. Babe.**

And that, Ladies and Gentlemen, is how one negotiates going to the dentist.

 **A/N: I forgot to add that ever so important disclaimer. So I'm adding it now for all previous chapters and this one as well. I do not own nor do I profit from any and or all of JE's works, (as much as I would love to, I'm not).**


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